Bolshoi Ballet Academy summer intensive auditions coming to Denver

A Bolshoi Ballet dancer in the 2013-14 season production of “Marco Spada.” Photo courtesy of the Bolshoi Ballet.

If you’re jealous of all the graceful athletes competing against each other in Russia at the moment, you may have a chance to join them (in the country, that is, not at the Olympics).

This weekend, the world-renowned Bolshoi Ballet Academy will hold auditions for its 2014 summer intensive program in New York and Connecticut. Aspiring area ballet dancers aged 9-24 who make the cut will get to hone their skills with master teachers from the Bolshoi, which is responsible for training international stars like Natalia Osipova, Alexei Ratmansky, Polina Semionova and Maria Kochetkova.

Even better — if significantly less likely — is the opportunity to get an all-expenses-paid six-week trip to Russia as part a scholarship funded by the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. The Bolshoi plans to select 15 lucky students from its summer intensive for the “life-changing” experience.

So where and when are the auditions?

Appropriately, Colorado Ballet will hold them at its home at 13th and Lincoln Streets on Denver’s Capitol Hill on Sunday, Feb. 16.